HP customer case study: SUSE Linux Enterprise Server on HP Integrity platform
Industry: travel
Travel industry innovator widens consumers’ horizons
with open architecture
“Our demands for IT performance, capacity, and scalability are incredible, and rising.
Over the past three years, we’ve grown from zero to 12 million low-fare transactions a
day, and this volume is increasing annually by about 30 percent. Our HP Integrity-based
Linux infrastructure keeps us ahead of the competition.”
—Luc Blanchet, Director of Software Services, Amadeus Global Travel Distribution S.A.
Objective:
Enable consumers to instantly access an ever-
evolving array of travel choices
Approach:
Cost-effectively expand CPU-intensive operation by
standardizing on robust, open source server farm
that scales out to match escalating demand
IT improvements:
• Price/performance gains from open-standards-
based HP Integrity platform
• Capacity, availability, and scalability to meet
rising global demand
• Flexibility to synchronize IT resources with
dynamic business needs
• Savings in both IT acquisition and maintenance World’s largest processor of travel bookings soars in
size and reach
Business benefits: The largest processor of travel transactions in the
• Split-second, 24x7 processing of more than world is Amadeus Global Travel Distribution S.A.
12 million transactions per day (www.amadeus.com). In 2005, the company executed
• Agility to rapidly expand portfolio of processing- more than 473 million travel bookings through its
intensive services global distribution system (GDS), which enables travel
agencies and airline offices throughout the world to
• Competitive leadership in innovative low-fare book with 95 percent of all scheduled airlines, 42 car
search offerings rental companies, more than 60,000 hotels, and 17
• Foundation for next-generation services cruise lines.

“. . . before long, a customer may ask,
‘I have 200 euros, where can I go?’ Our
operation is evolving rapidly toward this
level of complexity.”
—Luc Blanchet, Director of Software Services,
Amadeus Global Travel Distribution S.A.
Each day, Amadeus handles more than 280 million Standards streamline business and IT innovations
transactions and processes up to 2 million Internet Founded in 1987 by Air France, Lufthansa, Iberia, and
bookings at its data center in Erding, Germany, one of SAS, Amadeus introduced the first GDS to offer
the largest civilian data centers in Europe. HP servers unbiased, multi-carrier flight availability data and
running the HP-UX 11i v2, Microsoft® Windows®, operates the only GDS to achieve quality certification
and Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server operating (ISO 9001:2000).
systems make up the core of the 24x7 Amadeus
The pioneering company’s innovations have
IT infrastructure, which includes a 250-terabyte
transformed the travel business and revolutionized the
HP StorageWorks SAN.
consumer’s experience. Today, Internet-based travel
The fastest-growing segment of the infrastructure is the services are ubiquitous, driving down overhead and
Fare Quote system, which allows consumers to delivering split-second responsiveness as well as
evaluate alternative routes and prices before booking information and transaction transparency.
their trips. The system runs on a continuously
But continued leadership in this increasingly
expanding SUSE Linux Enterprise Server farm
competitive sector takes more than technology,
configuration of 59 HP Integrity rx8620 Servers, each
explains Blanchet. “Today, we are not just a GDS,”
equipped with 16 Intel® Itanium® 2 processors.
he says. “We are also an IT technology provider and
Handling more than 5,500 consumer requests per
partner to the travel and tourism industry.”
second during peak hours, the system takes less than
0.3 seconds to process inquiries and completes low- The Amadeus logo contains the tagline words, “Your
fare searches within five seconds. technology partner.” Amadeus helps travel-industry
stakeholders harness IT to improve efficiency,
“Our demands for IT performance, capacity, and
profitability, and competitiveness. Intending to be the
scalability are incredible, and rising,” says Luc
top IT service provider to the worldwide travel industry
Blanchet, director of software services at Madrid-based
by 2010, Amadeus continuously advances its Internet-
Amadeus, which employs 6,700 people in 78
based offerings to further enhance and streamline the
countries. “Over the past three years, we’ve grown
distribution and sale of travel services.
from zero to 12 million low-fare transactions a day,
and this volume is increasing annually by about 30
percent. Our HP Integrity-based Linux infrastructure
keeps us ahead of the competition.”
2

Amadeus is building an adaptable IT infrastructure Next-generation services poised for takeoff
that cost-effectively keeps pace with its dynamic, Producing more than 200 low-fare options in response
processing-intensive business. The company has to a single query, the Amadeus low-fare system
adopted an open-systems architecture to simplify and processes a host of preferences specified by the
streamline IT acquisition and support. “Our strategy is consumer, including dates, destinations, and airports.
to consolidate on three operating systems—UNIX®, “The business logic in the application tier consumes a
Linux, and Windows—to be as cost-competitive as we great deal of capacity and processing power,” says
can,” says Blanchet, “and access more and more Blanchet. “You need to line up many, many millions of
processing power at a bearable cost.” instructions before giving an answer to the customer.”
Open source—open future Already CPU-intensive, low-fare searches will soon
The Integrity-based Linux environment has proven to be become open-ended queries that magnify demand on
an ideal platform for the company’s rapidly expanding server capacity. “Customers used to simply look for
low-fare search services, explains Blanchet. “Our Linux availability and price when they wanted to travel from
component is growing faster than our other platforms,” A to B,” according to Blanchet. “Today, we provide the
he says. “It’s open source, so we can adjust the code customer with the entire palette of fares available for a
to exactly what we have to deliver. And there is broad specific itinerary. Now, they are accustomed to finding
market knowledge of Linux.” the best booking for their money. But before long, a
customer may ask, ‘I have 200 euros, where can I
Integrity servers provide the capacity, reliability, and
go?’ Our operation is evolving rapidly toward this level
scalability to support the mission-critical, 24x7 Linux
of complexity.”
environment. “Integrity servers cannot be considered
small machines,” says Blanchet. “They offer the With its farm configuration of Integrity servers,
right architecture for us to run our low-fare search Amadeus can readily access the processing power to
transactions. We scale out rather than scale up these run both current operations and next-generation
servers. Within two years, our Linux platform has more services. “To compete by offering an ever-richer palette
than doubled, going from 25 Integrity servers to 59.” of functions,” says Blanchet, “we need the ability to
rapidly evolve our low-fare search transaction products.
The scalability of the application layer is key.
3

Amadeus solution “With Integrity servers,” continues Blanchet, “we can “Integrity is a robust platform capable of running the
line up more power very quickly to answer market three operating systems that we want to use,” continues
at a glance needs. The way we have set up our architecture, this Blanchet. “But on top of that, when we endorsed open
Open source infrastructure on becomes fairly easy: we deploy Integrity servers to systems as our architecture, we already had a solid
HP Integrity servers enables world’s meet spikes and scale out in a cost-effective way.” partnership with HP, which provides both the services
largest travel booking service to
cost-effectively expand its CPU- and strong, scalable servers that are right for our
Flying higher with the right engine—and partner
intensive low-fare search business business. And we have direct contact with HP labs to
Blanchet’s IT team is testing the HP Virtual Server
Primary application provide feedback on product evolutions that support
• Fare Quote system Environment, which will enable the company to deploy
our growth.”
Primary hardware resources as needed across servers, improving the
• 59 HP Integrity rx8620 Servers, efficiency and flexibility of server utilization and These developments include HP’s new line of Integrity
each equipped with 16 Intel
Itanium 2 processors
simplifying management. “While ensuring that servers based on Dual-Core Intel Itanium 2 processors.
Primary software
processing power remains in sync with demand,” says “We expect dual-core Integrity servers to meet our
• Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Blanchet, “virtualization will give us even more return demand for ever-higher levels of capacity and
Server software from our investment.” processing power,” says Blanchet.
Committed to advancing the travel industry through “The transaction volume that we are processing today
innovations in both technology and service, Amadeus is already fairly impressive,” concludes Blanchet. “But
chooses its IT partners with care. Before selecting the we anticipate steep growth in our business. With HP
Integrity platform, Amadeus had already come to as our partner, I am confident that our architecture will
regard HP as a trusted collaborator. keep up with this growth.”
A disaster-tolerant HP-UX 11i v2 configuration of 11
HP 9000 Superdome Servers runs the Amadeus Altéa
reservation system, which travel agencies use to access
flight and frequent flyer information and to book trips.
Backed by Mission Critical Support from HP Services,
the infrastructure includes an HP SAN employing
HP StorageWorks XP disk arrays. “Our team of
HP Services professionals knows our entire environment
in depth,” says Blanchet, “and proactively guides us
in how to evolve our system to avoid problems. Their
expertise has been very valuable to us.
To learn more, visit www.hp.com
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4AA1-0436ENW, January 2007